Originally published in Morning Star News
Islamists killed an evangelist after he led several Muslims to faith in Christ at an open-air event in eastern Uganda last month, sources said.
David Washume of Manga cell, Mungoma Ward, Nabumali town council in Mbale District was stabbed to death on April 3 as he made his way back from three days of preaching in the Nalondo, Buwalasi and Nabumali areas, area sources said. He was 38.
With fellow evangelist Fred Wepuhulu, Washume incorporated quranic verses and biblical references in his preaching, emphasising the divinity of Christ and the humanity of Muhammad, the prophet of Islam, said one of those attending the event. Washume spoke in the town of Nabumali on the third day of their campaign.
“On the third day the attendance increased in number, and he demanded a response of putting sin to death in their lives, to kill sin and identify themselves with Christ and against Satan, and their voices lifted to Heaven in song,” said the attendee, whose name is withheld for security reasons. “Many people responded, including several Muslims who accepted Jesus as Lord and Saviour. But some Muslims started shouting in protest, and the two evangelists left and entered a friend’s home.”
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Washume and Wepuhulu were returning home to their area of Nabumali on the night of April 3 when they were attacked at about 10pm, Wepuhulu said.
“As we were nearing our village, we met three masked men dressed in Muslim attire, with knives, while speaking the Arabic language,” Wepuhulu told Morning Star News. “They stopped us and told us to surrender our bags.”
The assailants found Bibles and a Quran in Washume’s bag, he said.
“One shouted in our local language: ‘They are the ones, they are the ones…Kill, kill them!’” Wepuhulu said. “I realised that we were in the midst of militant Muslims. I wrestled with one of the them who was holding me tightly, but I managed to escape. My friend who was held by two men could not. Lastly I arrived at my home, but very fearful.”
Moses Kutosi, chairperson of local council 3 of the Nabumali Town Council, said he received a phone call at 6am the next day informing him of a dead body in a pool of blood near a Bible college chapel in Nabumali.
“Immediately I went to the scene of the incident and found the body of my resident friend Washume,” Kutosi told Morning Star News. “I was astonished and fearful and made a made a phone call to the police, who came after some hours.”
The body was taken to the Mbale city mortuary for postmortem, Kutosi said.
A relative of Washume said his body had wounds on the neck and chest.
“The knife which the assailants used to kill him was found at the scene of the crime, including a written note saying: ‘You, infidel, will meet Allah in judgment,’ and other Arabic words which could not be understood,” the relative said.
Kutosi said Washume was a good, hardworking and devoted Christian and a member of an undisclosed church in Mbale city.
Police and community members have mounted an intensive search for the killers, a police officer told Morning Star News.
The attack was the latest of many instances of persecution of Christians in Uganda that Morning Star News has documented.
Uganda’s constitution and other laws provide for religious freedom, including the right to propagate one’s faith and convert from one faith to another. Muslims make up no more than 12% of Uganda’s population, with high concentrations in eastern areas of the country.
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